Ian Rutherford Plimer (born 12 February 1946) is an Australian geologist, professor emeritus of earth sciences at the University of Melbourne,[1] professor of mining geology at the University of Adelaide,[2] and the director of multiple mineral exploration and mining companies.[3] He has published many scientific papers, six books and is one of the co-editors of Encyclopedia of Geology.[4][5] He has been an outspoken critic of both creationism and the scientific consensus on anthropogenic climate change.

Ian Plimer started as a tutor and senior tutor in Earth sciences at Macquarie University from 1968 to 1973.[9][10] After finishing his Ph.D., he became a lecturer in geology at the W.S. and L.B. Robinson University College of the University of New South Wales at Broken Hill from 1974 to 1979.[9][10] Plimer then went to work for North Broken Hill Ltd. between 1979 and 1982, becoming chief research geologist.[6][9][10] Due to his publication of a number of academic papers, he was offered a job as senior lecturer in economic geology at the University of New England in 1982.[6][9][10] After two years, he left to become a professor and head of geology at the University of Newcastle through 1991.[3][6] Plimer later served as professor and head of geology of the School of Earth Sciences at the University of Melbourne from 1991 to 2005.[3][6] He was conferred as professor emeritus of earth sciences at the University of Melbourne in 2005,[2] and is a professor of mining geology at the University of Adelaide.[1][3][11]

Plimer is the former non-executive director of CBH Resources Limited from 1998 to 2010, former non-executive director of Angel Mining plc from 2003 to 2005, former director of Kimberley Metals Limited from 2008 to 2009, former director of KBL Mining Limited from 2008 to 2009 and former director of Ormil Energy Limited from 2010 to 2011.[3][16]

He is currently the non-executive deputy chairman of KEFI Minerals since 2006,[17] independent non-executive director of Ivanhoe Australia Limited since 2007,[18] chairman of TNT Mines Limited since 2010,[11][19] non-executive director of Niuminco Group Limited (formerly DSF International Holdings Limited) since 2011,[20][21] and non-executive director of Silver City Minerals Limited since 2011.[3][16][22][23][24] Plimer was appointed director of Roy Hill Holdings and Queensland Coal Investments in 2012.[25]

According to a columnist in The Age, Plimer earned over $400,000 (AUD) from several of these companies, and he has mining shares and options worth hundreds of thousands of Australian dollars.[26] Plimer has stated that his business interests do not affect the independence of his beliefs.[22] He has also warned that the proposed Australian carbon-trading scheme could decimate the Australian mining industry.[6][27]

Carbon dioxide has an effect on the atmosphere and it has an effect for the first 50 parts per million and once it's done its job then it's finished and you can double it and quadruple it and it has no effect because we've seen that in the geological past, and we've seen it in times gone by when the carbon dioxide content was 100 times the current content. We didn't have runaway global warming, we actually had glaciation, so there's immediately a disconnect. So carbon dioxide is absolutely vital for living on earth; it's plant food, all of life lives off carbon dioxide. To demonise it shows that you don't understand school child science.

Plimer accuses the environmental movement of being irrational, and says that the vast bulk of the scientific community, including most major scientific academies, is prejudiced by the prospect of research funding. He characterised the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change as: "The IPCC process is related to environmental activism, politics and opportunism" and "the IPCC process is unrelated to science".[29] He is critical of greenhouse gas politics and says that extreme environmental changes are inevitable.[citation needed] Climatologists consider him a skeptic on climate change who misrepresents their data.[30] Other scientists, such as Donald Prothero another geologist, have reviewed similar data to Ian Plimer and have reached different conclusions [31][32]John Cooke (another Eureka Prize winner) maintains a website on climate change, Skeptical Science[33] and on his site describes Plimer as a Climate Misinformer.[34]

Plimer has stated that El Niño is caused by earthquakes and volcanic activity at the mid-ocean ridges and that the melting of polar ice has nothing to do with man-made carbon dioxide.[62] Plimer told Radio Australia that Pacific island nations are seeing changes in relative sea level not because of global warming but quite commonly due to other factors, such as "vibration consolidating the coral island sands", extraction of water, and extraction of sand for road and air strip making.[63]

I think that in response to the IPCC alarmist — in inverted commas — view, there've been quite a lot of other reputable scientific voices. Now not everyone agrees with Ian Plimer's position, but he is a highly credible scientist and he has written what seems like a very well-argued book refuting most of the claims of the climate catastrophists.

— Tony Abbott, The Sydney Morning Herald

By 2011, Abbott had modified his position and stated that climate change is real and humanity makes a contribution to it.[65]

In early 2010, Plimer and Christopher Monckton toured Australia giving lectures on climate change,[66] and Plimer's views came to be associated with Monckton's claim that the international left created the threat of catastrophic global warming. On this association, left-wing columnist Phillip Adams commented: "Praise the lord for Lord Monckton! For Ian Plimer! For [conservative columnist] Andrew Bolt! Not only does this evil axis of scientists tell lies [about the Greenhouse Effect] but they've also doctored the weather to frighten people with huge droughts, cyclones and tsunamis to prove what they now call 'global warming'."[67] Plimer’s book Not for Greens[68] expanded this view, in their review for this book by publishers Connorcourt Publishing state “Much of the green movement has now morphed into an unelected extremist political pressure group accountable to no one. Greens create problems, many of which are concocted, and provide no solutions because of a lack of basic knowledge. This book examines green policies in the light of established knowledge and shows that they are unrealistic.”[69] Climate scientist Ian McHugh "Fact Checks" some of the claims in the book [70] and finds a numbers of issues. He does not address the political questions raised in the book.

Plimer is an outspoken critic of creationism and is famous for a 1988 debate with creationist Duane Gish in which he asked his opponent to hold live electrical cables to prove that electromagnetism was 'only a theory'. Gish accused him of being theatrical, abusive and slanderous.[71]

In 1990 Plimer's anti-creationist behaviour were criticised in Creation/Evolution journal,[72] in an article titled "How Not to Argue with Creationists"[73] by skeptic and anti-creationist Jim Lippard for (among other things) including false claims and errors, and "behaving poorly" in the 1988 Gish debate.

In his book Telling Lies for God: Reason vs Creationism (1994), Plimer attacked creationists in Australia, in specific the Queensland-based Creation Science Foundation (now called Creation Ministries International or CMI), saying that claims of a Biblical global flood are untenable.[74] In the book he also criticised aspects of traditional Christian belief and literal interpretations of the Bible, with chapters titled "Scientific Fraud: The Great Flood of Absurdities" and "Disinformation Doublespeak".[71]

In the late 1990s, Plimer went to court alleging misleading and deceptive advertising under the Trade Practices Act 1974 against Noah's Ark searcher Allen Roberts,[74] arising from Plimer's attacks on Roberts' claims concerning the location of Noah's Ark. Before the trial, Plimer was removed by police from public meetings at which Roberts spoke.[71] The court ruled that Roberts' claims did not constitute trade or commerce, and so were not covered by the act. It found that Roberts had indeed made false and misleading claims on two of 16 instances cited by Plimer, Plimer had failed to show the other 14, and the two were minor enough to not require remedy. Plimer lost the case,[75] and was ordered to pay his own and Roberts' legal costs estimated at over 500,000 Australian dollars.[76][77]

^Gocher K (21 April 2010). "Volcano climate change". Rural Online. Australian Broadcasting Corporation."Professor Ian Plimer has long argued that large volcanic eruptions will release more carbon into the atmosphere than human-induced activity..."

^Plimer, Ian (29 May 2009). "Vitriolic climate in academic hothouse | The Australian". www.theaustralian.com.au. Retrieved 24 May 2010. Some 85 per cent of volcanoes are unseen and unmeasured yet these heat the oceans and add monstrous amounts of CO2 to the oceans. Why have these been ignored?